Autumn stood at the edge of the abyss, staring down into the dark once more.

Whispers, dark and unhallowed, echoed up from the bleak nothingness. Were they real? The dark-eyed witch wondered. Or just phantoms of her deranged mind? Ghosts of the imagination.

It mattered not.

When they’d finally rested and recovered, the party had gathered together to discuss their findings and forge a plan to find the missing key. While Autumn had thought the task impossible, akin to finding a needle in a haystack in a ravine, Edwyn thankfully had a solution.

The former miner made a series of modifications to a rune meant to find seams of ore. Rather, it’d now instead send a magical pulse skittering across the surface of the ravine’s walls and into its crevasses and caves to pick out any exposed metals. They were pinning their hopes on that the key was both metal and detectable by the runic magic.

And, after a few false-positive results, they found it.

Not too far from the mimic treasure room lay a shallow cave nestled into the rocky wall of the ravine. Thankfully, it was on their side of the rift and only a few dozen feet down.

Making their way to it through the twisting maze-like pathways was no mean feat, but they’d done so anyway. Now they stood above the small cave, staring down into the dark.

Initially, Liddie had volunteered to head down to retrieve the stolen key, most likely to soothe her wounded pride. However, as she was still somewhat woozy from the bloodloss, despite Pyre’s potions, they’d all vetoed her and Eme had stepped up to descend in her stead.

While Liddie sulked, Nethlia tied a few lengths of rope together and made a harness for Eme like she’d done for the pirate before.

“That tight enough?”

Eme nodded after bouncing in place to test it. “Seems to be. It doesn’t feel loose anywhere. Am I good to go?”

“Yes, descend when you’re ready,” Nethlia answered. She’d wrapped the other end of the rope around herself multiple times to serve as Eme’s anchor. “Remember, just tug on the rope three times or yelp and I’ll pull you up.”

“Go it,” Eme nodded. Approaching the edge of the yawning rift, she gulped before slowly backing over it.

Autumn found it frustrating to be forced to sit back as her bardic girlfriend was lowered into the dark ravine alone, but there was little she could do but watch and worry. If she felt more confident in her own athletic ability, she’d have volunteered herself, but it was not to be. She had to remind herself to have faith in her compatriot’s abilities.

Still, it was a stressful experience.

Fortunately, nothing was lying in wait for the lithe catgirl and she bounced swiftly down to the shallow cave unmolested.

The cave itself was little more than a crack in the rocky wall. While relatively deep, it was barely wide enough for Eme to wedge herself into it, let alone try to enter. Nestled securely into the gap, she peered inside, letting the dim light of the magical lantern on her waist reveal the gloom.

Piles of refuse and glittering metal littered the floor amongst mounds of stinking bat guano. Looking up, Eme saw hundreds of desert bats clinging to the ceiling. While none awoke at her arrival, she held her breath as they shifted in their sleep.

Eme screwed up her cute nose at the smell and reached inside the cave. She carefully groped around for anything metal or key-shaped.

Above, the others watched on anxiously.

After a few tense moments, Eme found what she was looking for and withdrew the key with an instinctive gasp of success.

The sound was like a gunshot in the small cave.

Suddenly awoken, the mass of bats let out shrill, panicking screeches and launched themselves towards the entrance of the cavern. Eme let out a yelp of surprise as the colony slammed into her and sent her tumbling out of the hole. The rope went taut in Nethlia’s hands and the berserker hurriedly started hauling her up.

Autumn’s heart leapt into her throat as the bats swarmed around Eme’s form. It was all she could do not cast spell after spell into the mass in fear of hitting the bard hidden within.

Suddenly, Eme’s voice broke through the screeching.

“I’m okay!” She shouted up, to the relief of the anxious party. “I got the key! I think! Pull me up now, please!”

Needing no other encouragement, Nethlia continued hauling on the rope and brought Eme back up. Behind the departing catgirl, the disturbed colony of bats dispersed themselves around the ravine and disappeared into other dark caves and cracks in the walls.

When Eme finally set her shaking legs back on the top of the deep ravine, she pushed the retrieved key into Autumn’s hands.

Looking down at it, the key looked surprisingly mundane for what it represented. Rather than a traditional key like she’d imagined, with a turning handle and blocky teeth, the bronze key Autumn held in her hands was circular in design and had a thick cog on one side. Ornate patterns decorated the front, worn down by time.

Autumn tucked the key away in her belt of holding after a brief inspection.

Other than a few minor scratches and some messy hair, Eme was unharmed. That still didn’t stop Autumn from fussing over her, much to Eme’s blushing embarrassment and not-so-secret joy. With a few flicks of magic, she was all cleaned up.

“Where to now?” Eme asked.

Nethlia looked over at the question as she repacked the lengths of rope she’d used to lower Eme. A quick glance around the party showed nobody wished to speak up first. She thought over their options as she shouldered her pack.

“Well,” she drawled, “now that we’ve got this trial’s key, we could just go back. Presumably, we’ll find the next within the trial of magic, or whatever it was. If it hasn’t been stolen already, that is.”

“There are three keys, remember?” Autumn pointed out. “One could be on the far side of the ravine through that other intact door.”

“The key might also be behind that collapsed passageway,” Nelva said, gesturing over to the sundered door. “But I don’t know what we could do about that if it is.”

“Aye,” Edwyn rumbled. “Diggin’ it out would take us some time. An’ it’s not likely tae be very stable besides.”

Nethlia nodded slowly, a grimace flashing across her face. “Those are fair points, but we’ve got wounded. A quick break back at camp would do us some good.”

“Hey now, I’m not an invalid,” Liddie scoffed from the side, mildly offended as she crossed her arms over her chest.

While she was up and about, the potions having done wonders for her, she still looked a bit pale and woozy. Still, that didn’t seem to make a difference to the headstrong pirate. “Just need to stretch my legs a bit and I’ll be fine. I’ll be across that gap before you lot. I say we check it out. The far door. No point in leaving if we have to turn back later to find our missing key. This way, even if we don’t find it, we can mark this location off our map.”

Autumn gave Liddie a dubious look. She wasn’t sure if she was actually fine, or if that was just her pride talking.

Nethlia held up a hand as she thought in silence. After a moment, she breathed out. “Alright,” she said calmly, “if everyone is in agreement, then we press on. But make sure to stick together — there’s no telling what this place will throw at us next.”

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A gap yawned before Autumn’s booted feet, separated her from the other side of the ravine. No more than ten feet or so divided the branch she stood on and a broken stone bridge dangling over the chasm. She’d jumped further before, and even with all her gear weighing her down, Autumn was sure she could make it.

But that wasn’t what made her hesitate.

For she’d been here before. Not this exact spot, no, but she’d stood before a ravine like it once and had leapt then too.

Gods, how long ago had that been? A month? Two? And how had this become her norm?

Thankfully, no immortal host was on her heels this time.

A familiar feeling crept into Autumn’s mind as she glanced once more across the gap, gauging the distance. That of her stomach falling away as a little voice in the back of her head whispered “jump.”

Was it concerning if she didn’t know if that voice was hers or not?”

Behind her, the others waited patiently.

As the group’s resident athlete, Autumn had taken it upon herself to go first. Her job would be to carry one end of their rope across the chasm and secure it to the other side to allow the others to cross safely. Or, reasonably safely.

While Nethlia would’ve done so herself, and likely easily, they needed her on this side of the ravine both to tighten the rope once Autumn had tied it to the bridge and to help anyone else across if they needed it. Already she’d hammered another piton into the thick wood. This time not summoning another horde of horrors, thankfully.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to just throw you across?” Nethlia asked for what felt like the tenth time.

Autumn shook her head while smiling at the image. Slowly, she bounced on her heels to warm up. “Nah, I can make it,” she said confidently. “No offense, but I think I can do better on my own. Just hold onto the rope for me?”

“Sure.”

Backing up from the edge, Autumn tucked all her loose gear away into her belt along with the heaviest of the party’s things that’d fit. She cracked her neck as she loosened up. In her chest, her heart beat a steady rhythm as she breathed deeply. In and out.

She felt free.

In that moment, her worries fled. All she could focus on was her body and the jump. Nothing else mattered.

With a sharp exhale, Autumn took off.

Her boots pounded the bark like the beat of a drum. Heavy steps saw her racing towards the edge. It approached far too soon for her liking, but with a grunt, she leapt.

Autumn sailed through the air. The wind whipped through her hair as it streamed along behind her. She enjoyed the sensation. She enjoyed the adrenaline pulsing through her veins like a wildfire.

Over the lightless abyss, she flew.

Free.

No matter how darksome shadows clawed, within and without, they could not reach her.

Unfortunately, the witch’s flight ended as swiftly as it began.

Autumn’s boots hit the stonework first, sending a shower of broken pebbles down into the chasm as she threw herself forwards into an awkward stumble. A grin stretched across her features like a knife wound as her breath came out shuddering and heavy. She struggled to contain herself as she bled off her momentum.

When her euphoria faded, Autumn searched for somewhere to tie off her end of the rope. A solid-looking pillar on the edge of the bridge served her purposes just fine. With it secured, she waved back to her friends on the other side.

Nethlia tightened the slack rope before tying it off.

One by one, the party, aside from Nethlia and Edwyn, shimmied across the rope to Autumn’s side. They took different means to cross the gap.

Edwyn had expressed their concern as to their inability to perform the high-flying acrobats that those of a less stocky, boxy-shaped race could. They were mostly worried about getting stuck in the middle when the rope would sag beneath their weight.

Thankfully, Nethlia had an alternative solution.

Autumn had to bite her lip when the towering demoness berserker picked Edwyn up and tossed the grumbling dwarf— err, Manus over the gap to the others waiting to catch them.

“Not. A. Word.” Edwyn glared at them all in turn. They paid particular attention to those of them snickering under their breaths. “This never happened, ye hear!”

“You know,” Autumn snorted, “we’re likely coming back this way. So…” she drawled pointedly.

Edwyn scowled at her.

Nethlia landed on the stones with a heavy thud, sending a layer of stone dust crumbling off the bottom of the bridge. Like Autumn, she’d leapt across, not trusting the rope with her weight. Although she did so with far more ease than Autumn had.

“Alright, enough teasing,” Nethlia smiled.

With all of them gathered now safely on this side of the ravine, and with their way back secured, they set off towards the only door on this side.

----------------------------------------

Arriving before the door, Autumn cast a discerning look over it as Liddie examined it for traps or locks.

It looked different from the rest of the tomb, like a leech suckling onto a decaying carcass. Thick, red painted wood sat securely in the stone wall. Judging by the chisel marks left on the mural surrounding the strange door, someone had added it here after the main tomb had been completed. Likely a lot later, but before the earthquake had sundered the chamber given that the thin stone wall that’d once hidden the door from prying eyes now lay shattered on the ground before it.

For what purpose someone had carved out a space within the tomb, Autumn didn’t know, but that strange dark feeling of dread was creeping up her spine again.

“Anything?”

Liddie glanced back at Nethlia as the taller demoness asked her that question. She shook her head. “Nothing. I can’t see any obvious traps, but it is locked. Don’t worry, it’s just a mechanical trap, give me a second and I’ll have it open. Strange that it’s so different from the rest of the place.”

Nethlia glanced at the red door. “Good, open it.”

Liddie rolled her eyes. With a few flicks of her lock-picking tools, she triggered the ancient lock to open. The lock let out an ominous grinding as the old mechanism inside strung to life after an age and a half of entrenchment.

“Just needs a little love tap,” Liddie grunted out as she kicked the door.

For a moment Autumn worried that the door would seize up, but it slowly creaked open under the pirate’s percussive persuasion.

Instantly, a wave of heat washed over them.

Autumn recoiled. Staggering back, she covered her face with her tattered sleeves to fend it off — for all the good it did. When she finally adjusted to the sudden change, Autumn peeked into the hallway beyond the red door.

A fiery hell greeted her.

Roaring flames poured forth from a myriad of small holes in the walls, ceiling, and floor at random intervals, bathing the blackened corridor in hellfire. Fireballs, fire blasts, spouts of napalm, and pools of liquid flame — there was no discernible pattern to the activation of the traps, at least not in Autumn’s eyes.

“Uh, I totally didn’t do that!” Liddie defended herself as the others looked at her. “I swear there weren’t any traps on the door!”

Autumn rolled her eyes. Glancing down the corridor with her magical sight, she spotted a pair of runes through the magical flames. One at this end of the trapped hallway and another at the other end. The one on their end was dark. Broken.

A quick inspection courtesy of Edwyn revealed that it was a command sigil, likely meant to deactivate the traps. Now if someone wished to do so, they’d need to brave the flames first.

While her shield could take a lot of punishment, Autumn didn’t know if it’d shield her from that. Sure, it’d survived a strike from an undead angel and having a mountain of stone fall upon it, but she’d never tested it against heat and magical flames. At least, not that she could recall.

“None of you would happen to be immune to fire, would you?” Autumn asked hopefully.

“Only resistant,” Nethlia and Liddie said at the same time. “And not to this level,” Nethlia added.

Autumn glanced over at the flaming-haired Pyre. She scowled back at Autumn and hastily shook her head. “Don’t look at me! I’m only immune to mundane flames and those are clearly magical. I’ll burn up into a crisp like the rest of you. And before you ask, no, I don’t have any fire-protection potions.”

“Huh, I didn’t know that. The mundane flame thing,” Autumn clarified. Turning back to the fires, she eyed the blackened corridor trepidatiously. “Should we turn back? I could try to make it through, but I don’t know if my shield will hold up to it. I’ve not tested it against fire before.”

Nethlia shook her head. “Best not risk it. Edwyn, Liddie, could either of you disarm the traps?”

“No can do, boss,” Liddie said, crossing her arms in an x. “These traps are dug far too in the walls for me to reach by the looks of them. And the flames feel hot enough to melt anything you try to plug the gaps with. We could try and break down the walls, but that might just bring the whole corridor down.”

“Aye. Let’s not be doin’ that,” Edwyn grumbled as they knocked on the carved walls. They didn’t look impressed with what they saw. “These traps are out o’ range o’ ma runes. I could try tae lob one down the hall, but the flame’ll break ‘em before they reach the command rune at the other end. Sorry.”

“That’s fine,” Nethlia placated the disgruntled pair. “Anyone else have any ideas? If not, we might as well head back.”

Autumn hummed. “I could take a haste potion and sprint through with my shield up. That could work—”

“I could do it,” Eme spoke up shyly, interrupting Autumn. She blushed slightly when everyone turned to her. “I, uh, I can do it.”

“How so?”

Visibly steeling herself, Eme gestured to the flaming traps going on and off down the blackened hallway. “Um, well, the traps aren’t exactly random — there’s a pattern to them. A rhythm. Music,” she explained to their blank looks. “I can hear it. It’s a little off-key,” she winced at only a sound she could hear, or at least make sense of. “With a few bardic spells, I should be able to get through it alright. I hope,” she whispered that last part.

The group cast a look down the trapped hallway as one and tried to see and/or hear what the bard did. To them, it just looked and sounded like a chaotic mess.

“Are you sure?” Nelva asked. “There is no shame in us retreating. We don’t even know what is down there.”

Eme drew in a deep breath as she looked around at the others. Bravely, she nodded. “I’m sure. I’ve been practicing my spell-songs, trying to make them linger for longer. Now, I think I can keep them going long enough to have a pair of songs going. If I cast both Alacrity of Form and the Quickened Wit of the Fox on myself, I should be able to make it through unscathed.”

Autumn swallowed down her instinctive desire to deny Eme. Instead, she nodded tightly, not trusting her words.

It was hard for her to place her faith in another’s abilities, especially of someone she wished to protect from harm.

“Alright. If you’re sure, then I-we all trust you. But if you get hurt, I’ll be right there beside you so fast you’ll think I teleported,” Autumn playfully threatened the catgirl. Oh, how she wished she could actually teleport.

Eme giggled.

Stepping up, Edwyn pressed a rune into Eme’s palm. “Here, smash this against the control rune when ya get tae the other side. That should deactivate the traps. Good luck,” they grumbled, patting the catgirl on her shoulder for good luck.

Eme nodded to Edwyn, before nodding to Nethlia as well, when the berserker gently clapped her on the shoulder after the runemaster.

Standing in front of the blackened corridor and fire within, the catgirl bard, armed with dragonbone and dragonblade, hummed under her breath a tune of her own making. Magic slowly filled her limbs and mind as the spell-songs took hold.

First came Alacrity. The spell warmed the bard’s limbs, lightening them and allowing her to move with a supernatural grace.

Second came Wit. It warmed her mind. Her reflexes. It allowed her to think with a grace to match that of her body and movements.

After pouring a skin of water over herself, Eme stepped past the first of the flames gracefully. She held her breath as the super-heated air scorched her, seeking to burn her lungs. Still, she moved down the burning corridor as if in a trance.

Dancing.

Flames licked at her clothing, catching the smallest threads alight for barely a second before she moved on. However, never once did they burn her skin. Hot sweat poured down the bard’s back as she danced through the fire and the flames. But, she allowed it to bother her not.

Autumn stood at the forefront of the group, heart pounding in her throat as she watched on. Tightly, she grasped her wand, ready to dash to Eme’s aid no matter the danger to herself.

Thankfully, she wasn’t needed.

Eme flowed around and under the traps with feline grace. With one last leap, she cartwheeled over a billowing napalm trap and rolled to freedom at the end of the hallway beneath another. Turning, she slammed Edwyn’s rune into the command sigil and panted as she watched the traps shut down.

As soon as they did, Autumn sprinted down the corridor, slamming into Eme with a bone-breaking hug.

“Water!” Eme croaked from her witch prison.

Autumn detached herself from the sweaty catgirl and hurriedly retrieved a full waterskin for her. The parched bard drained it in seconds. When she was done, Eme grinned proudly even as she heaved warm air into her lungs.

Striding up more sedately than Autumn’s hurried rush, Nethlia clapped Eme proudly on her back. The force almost knocked the poor Felis over.

“Good job!” Nethlia beamed, not minding how sweaty the catgirl had gotten. “Now, how about we see what’s behind this ominous door, huh?” she said, gesturing over her shoulder.

Startled, Autumn turned and took in the door she’d missed. It loomed before her, a deep red like the other. However, this one still seemed almost…wet. She shuddered to think what the paint was. The door gave off an almost physical presence. It felt…inviting. But in the same way a gingerbread house in the middle of a haunted woods looked inviting.

Incongruent.

Despite everything telling her to flee, to turn around and go the other way, Autumn pushed the door open and gazed into the room beyond.

Behind her, the others of this world inhaled a horror-filled gasp.

“We shouldn’t be here.”